DVD & VIDEO COLLECTION: DIRECTORS [Q-Z]

Gloria Grahame & Humphrey Bogart

"Lotte Reinger spent much of her life creating unique and often amazing silhouette animation. Between 1923 and 1926, Rieniger and Koch, with assistance from animators Walter Rutmann, Bertolt Bartosch, and Alex Kardan, created The Adventures of Prince Achmed. One of the world's first feature-length animated films, The Adventures of Prince Achmed displayed Reiniger's ability to create captivating characters through intricate design and an amazingly graceful sense of movement. The film remains unsurpassed as a demonstration of animated art." - Cartoon Hall of Fame

Adolf Hitler and Leni Riefenstahl

"Jesse" Owens at 1936 Berlin Olympics

Taxi Zum Klo (taxi to the toilet) is an experimental autobiography, a feature document of gay life in 1980s West Berlin. Frank, a public school teacher by day, trolls the toilets at night in search of tearoom trade. . . Still shocking in its frank portrayal of sexual subculture, Taxi was heralded as 'the first masterpiece about the mainstream of male gay life' by the Village Voice.

Rivette's greatest film. . . turns out to be the first commercial hit of his career. . . this may be because the beautiful lead actress, Emmanuelle Béart is nude, posing as a painter's model, for about half of the film. . . it also seems that . .. Rivette has finally hit on a subject � the collective and individual struggles that produce art and the prices that have to be paid for that art � that speaks to a wide audience. The fact that La belle noiseuse is four hours long makes this even more of an achievement. . ."

• Jonathan Rosenbaum

FILMOGRAPHY:
• L'immortelle (1963)
• Trans-Europ-Express (1966)
• L'homme qui ment (1968)
• L'Eden et apres (1970)
• Glissements progressifs du plaisir (1974)
• La belle captive (1983)
• The Blue Villa (1995)
• C'est Gradiva qui vous appelle (2006)
LINKS:
• Wikipedia

"La Belle Captive may be Robbe-Grillet's most entertaining and accomplished film. It dazzles the eye by creating a series of secret encounters inspired by Magritte's surrealist painting, which the director named his film after . . . Motifs from vampire films and erotic thrillers are interwoven with more hermetic scenes, but it's somehow all held together by the repeated image of a black clad woman riding a motorcycle. . . " Foreignmoviedsddl.org

robeson-EmperorJones300x169.jpg empire jones

Paul Robeson in Emperor Jones (1933)

Sanaders of the River (1935)
Director: Zoltan Korda
Producer: Alexander Korda
London Film Productions

Paul Leroy Robeson was a great American bass-baritone concert singer, recording artist, athlete and actor who became noted for his political radicalism and activism in the civil rights movement. He is one of the first black artists to refuse segregated audiences. He spent much of his life actively working for equality and fair treatment for all of America's citizens as well as citizens of the world. At the height of his career, Robeson chose to become primarily a political artist.

Robeson was upset with the producers of Sanders of the River as he claimed that they had turned it into a pro-imperialist film. He later wrote that "it is the only one of my films that can be shown in Italy and Germany, for it shows the Negro as Fascist States desire him - savage and childish."

Oscar Micheaux, the director of Body and Soul (1925), was the Godfather of black film.

LINKS:
• Blacks in Cinema

LINKS:
• Senses of Cinema

LINKS:
• Wikipedia

LINKS:
• Sense of cinema

Michel Piccoli and Romy Schneider

starring Emmanuelle Béart & Daniel Auteuil

LINKS:
• Senses of cinema

DON SIEGEL
LINKS:
• Senses of cinema

LINKS:
• Senses of Cinema

STEVEN SODERBERGH
LINKS:
• Senses of Cinema

ALEXANDER SOKUROY
LINKS:
• The Island of Sokurov
• Wikipedia

FERNANDO SOLANAS
links:
• Senses of Cinema

A Serbian Film (Srpski film)

STEVEN SPIELBERG
LINKS:
• Senses of Cinema

Lee Grant and Shelley Winters

JEAN-MARIE STRAUB
LINKS:
• Senses of Cinema

ERIC VON STROHEIM
LINKS:
• MUBI: Foolish Wives

PRESTON STURGES
LINKS:
• Senses of Cinema

SEIJUN SUZUKI
LINKS:
•

JAN SVANKMAJER
LINKS:
• JanSvankmajer.com
• Wikipedia

"How do you get rid of a book?"

"Who really set the town aflame? . . ."

In 1956, Taradash belatedly pinned his liberal heart to his sleeve when he made a failed stab at direction with Storm Center, a moral fable about a small town librarian (Bette Davis) defying local book-bumers and having the library torched for her trouble. . . even those critics inclined to give Taradash the benefit of the doubt on the basis of his work with Lang and Ray were unimpressed. - encyclopedia

"Storm Center is the quintessential anti censorship film, offering a very strong, positive image of the librarians played by both Davis and Kim Hunter. Even though the storyline is dated and the town's emotional reversal is somewhat unbelievable, Davis is convincing as the principled librarian, especially as she ponders the question 'How do you get rid of a book?'"

Tarkovsky in hospital during filming of Mirror

I think censorship is always there. Then it was the censorship of the state and now it's the censorship of the market. - Béla Tarr

LINKS:
• dvdbveaver

Inmates at Rebibbia prison

Life Line by Victor Erice

Film director, cinematographer, documentarian, essayist, photographer and artist who developed a style of documentary filmmaking termed the "direction of undirected action." Born on February 21, 1937 in Grozny, Russia (Soviet Union).

Vartanov & Parajanov

Mikhail Vartanov developed a method of documentary filmmaking termed the 'direction of undirected action' and his work as a documentarian, cinematographer, and essayist became revered through such timeless films as Seasons of the Year (1975), Parajanov: The Last Spring (1992), and a series of essays including The Unmailed Letters, He remains little known outside the small circle of intellectuals and his followers.

Written by PARAJANOV.com

Seasons of the Year (1975)
Director: Artavazd Peleshyan
cinematographer: Mikhail Vartanov

"LES SALSONS" 1972 (27:57")

After Mikhail "Misha" Vartanov completed his wordless debut film The Color of Land (1969), he was blacklisted. His cast - the modernist painter Minas was later assassinated and the legendary filmmaker, Paradjanov, was imprisoned.

For corresponding with the imprisoned Parajanov, and for bravely petitioning for his release, Vartanov was fired from Armenia's only film studio and he was not allowed to direct for 10 years. During this time, thanks to the tireless petitions of his friends Artavazd Peleshian and Gennadi Melkonian, Vartanov was able to work as their cinematographer and exquisitely lensed two of their films that became classics: Four Seasons(1975) and The Mulberry Tree (1979). In 1984 Vartanov and Paradianoy were taken off the blacklist; Vartanov was permitted to again create his own work.His final film and masterpiece, Parajanov: The Last Spring (1992) was highly admired by many cineastes. Vartanov died in Hollywood on New Year's Eve 2009.

The Furies:
Alecto, Megaera, and Tisiphone

roll-over The Furies

Crime Without Passion (1934)

Moods of the Sea is a non-narrative visual(1941) film by Slavko Vorkapich and John Hoffman (1904-1980), set to the music of Felix Mendelssohn known as the Hebrides (or Fingal's Cave) Overture. This 10-minute-long film has become well known as an early example of American avant-garde and independent film.

Divine in "Pink Flamingoes

Mekong Hotel (2012)
Apichatpong Weerasethakul Ashes 2012

Ashes (2012)

"One of the most scathing indictments of American culture ever produced by a Hollywood filmmaker, Billy Wilder's Ace in the Hole is legendary for its cutting social critique. . . Kirk Douglas gives the fiercest performance of his career." - dvdbeaver

The soundtrack was composed in August 1951 by Bernard Herrmann; it was his first soundtrack after he moved from New York to Hollywood. Herrmann chose unusual instrumentation for the film including violin, cello, and bass (all three electric), two theremin electronic instruments (played by Samuel Hoffman and Paul Shure), two Hammond organs, a large studio electric organ, three vibraphones, two glockenspiels, two pianos, two harps, three trumpets, three trombones, and four tubas.

A quiet, intelligent, ambitious science student pursues the meaning of life while leading his own in 1970s Warsaw